9/28/2007 1:50 PM
posted awhile ago
Re:FilmCouch #39
Black Gold is another film that explores the negative impact of, well, neo-liberal economic policies on the Global South relative to coffee. I'm generally a big fan of this type of issue documentary, but I am always disappointed at the lack of action produced by awareness-raising. I sometimes wonder if film's like Wall Street and "Black Gold" have the effect of normalizing certain types of corporate behaviors. The public demands fair-trade coffee to protect worker's wages, but does little to increase access to safe drinking water in the third world. In Haiti and the DR particularly, the majority of the population does not have a reliable source of clean drinking water. The labor conditions in "The Price of Sugar" can easily be described as human trafficking (particularly because their identification documents are taken away). I think you hit the nail on the head relative to the lack of action by the US to end this type of activity because of its broader economic interests. There is consensus and political will to combat sex trafficking of minors in South Asia, but not to end the forced labor and modern-day enslavement of tens of thousands of Latin Americans. The US is no longer a moral authority in the world, in part because of it does not universally protect human rights.
|